Chronicles of coaching American football in Sicily (2008 and 2009), in Sweden (2010 and 2016), in Switzerland (2012), winning a Division III National Championship in France (2012-13) and in Spain (2015 and 2016) as well as walking the Camino de Santiago in August-September of 2010.

About Me

I have been married to Laurie for over 45 years. Our oldest son, Andy, lives in Las Vegas, Nevada with his wife Jenn and their son Kevin. Our youngest son Mike lives in Oxnard, California with his wife Vanessa and their kids Jacob and Mary. Although I retired from teaching in June of 2007, the 2015 football season marked my 45th year of coaching football at five high schools in Southern California's Ventura County - Thousand Oaks, Westlake, Rio Mesa, Buena and Newbury Park. In 2008, I opted to try something totally different in my coaching career and started coaching in Europe. My EuroBall stops have been in Catania, Sicily in 2008 and 2009, Hässleholm, Sweden in 2010, Thun, Switzerland in 2012, Lyon, France in 2012-13 with the 12-0 National Champion Bron-Villeurbanne Falcons, Murcia, Spain in 2015, Rivas, Spain in 2016 and finally Upplands-Väsby, Sweden in the Spring of 2016 and 2017. Join me as I explore and chronicle my newest adventures coaching American football in Europe. My European touring also included a 500 mile Pilgrimage Walk on the Camino de Santiago in Spain in 2010.

Friday, February 8, 2008

Just Say No

While folding the boys’ laundry this morning I found Matt’s “D.A.R.E. to Keep Kids Off Drugs” T-shirt. I almost cried.

We have tried to keep this a secret from his family and friends back in Texas but truth be told Matt has an addictive personality. Of course cannoli are his drug of choice and I am personally very distraught knowing that I was the one who bought him his first one. We all were enablers in his addiction to some point even giving him the funny nickname Obi Won Cannoli, now we all feel so cheap and dirty for what we did to encourage Matt’s binging.

Matt went totally out of control about 8 days ago, I even found a partially eaten cannolo in the pocket of one of his shorts I was washing last night, very disturbing indeed.

With the help of the pastor and congregation at Calvary Baptist Church and the Elefanti team we convinced Matt that we were taking him to Cannoli R Us but in truth it was a lie to get him to an intervention session. It was a very tense two hours but finally Matt confronted the truth about his problem, promised to “be a man” as he put it and agreed to enter the Cannoli Anonymous chapter in nearby Aci Reale.

We visited him yesterday, he looks pale, has lost a lot of weight, his skin is clammy and he is very edgy. The staff tells us that this is all normal at this point and that they had never seen such a severe case in their 60+ years of existence. At his current pace they will release him back to us in another two weeks.

We are not sure how long the IFL will suspend him for violating the league’s substance abuse policy. Davide hopes that Matt will be suspended for only the first three games of the season as a first time offender, the maximum penalty is five games. Our season may hang on the Commissioner’s decision.

We’ll continue to do all we can for him here, please pray for him back home, this will be a longand difficult journey to complete recovery.